I know you claim a middle ground, but it seems that you are really quite a staunch advocate for the ACME.

No, I'm really not at all. ACME and OMM are both incomplete models. If you are coming from OMM though, impartiality or being in the middle will seem that I'm too far ACME.

Impressive acronyming by the way. You should work in advertising. Either you were joking, unaware or you have been somewhat sly and disingenuous...

Nope. I found myself suddenly awake at 4:00am and couldn't get back to sleep. I was sort of mulling over what people were telling me on the previous thread and what bubbled up as the core principle that I object to in what people were saying was that 'only matter matters'. So cool, I thought what would the counterpart be on the other side and what came up was 'anything can mean anything'.

Perhaps noticing the mm and the aa I thought, hm, if I change the second 'anything' to 'everything' then I would get ACME - which, culturally, in the US, for people my age means only one thing:

I wasn't sure how ACME ties in to that worldview and when I compared it to OMM, I began to see there was a bit of a switch - ACME would be a name associated with corporate, mercantile, industrial ubiquity while OMM would be a mantra sound and (interestingly almost a mirror of Woo). The idea of using a word from cartoons interested me though because the ACME cosmos is a cartoon cosmos - disembodied images.

Then I thought about it and realized that the intuitive matching makes an interesting point. Since these are the extremes of the continuum, they represent 'pushing it too far' until they become, in many ways, a mirror image of what they seek to be rid of. It works. I can see that OMM is like a sticking-fingers-in-one's-ears trance - but of course OMM disciples won't see it that way at all...they see themselves as ACME. The peak. Achieving great things. Selling technology. (I'm not unaware of the dictionary definition of acme, but I promise, I was as surprised as you were that that was the acronym that made sense.

OMM vs ACME named itself. Through me of course.

Quote

Which leads me to the meat, the heart, the hard core of your intent, which I in turn am going to subtitle "woo as a useful life tool" and of course a second subtitle "taking the pith".

I would say "it's important to understand woo from the inside, so that you can learn how not to project it onto the material world too much.' - the same is true for OMM, important to understand it empirically, and important to keep it on the outside and not project it in'.

Quote

As I and others have repeatedly asked you in other threads Immed, have you even one practical suggestion of how to use woo in one's life, let alone in science?

I honestly have no recollection of anyone asking me for anything which I did not deliver rapidly upon the next response. Except Omen, who decided that demanding I produce definitions for dozens of common words. Sorry, I don't do definitions spats.

To answer your question, first of all imposes OMM right away. The OMM takes for granted that life exists for strictly practical reasons, which, particularly for the hard problem of consciousness, is far from established. Practical suggestion of what? What do you want? 'Excercise more. Avoid refined carbs.' It's not about 'using woo in one's life', it's just about adding a layer of intuitive awareness so that you make fewer mistakes and cause fewer problems. It's about patience, and honesty, and not having to turn time into money every second of your life --- because it's ruining civilization.

Quote

Have you one instance to show that your impassioned wishful thinking, and emotional investment can be justified with just one practical use for woo of any sort (aside from panacea).

Practical Use is all OMM. Human consciousness has no practical use for the universe. Woo awareness, properly integrated in healthy proportion, provides layers of meaning which cross reference between time, yourself, friends. The other day I had a friend of mine I hadn't seen in 20 years call me to read her teenage son's chart (who I never met) and so I did and I modeled the conflicts she and he have for her in astrological and plain English. She asked me for advice on how to deal with their fights and I told her about the difference between people with charts like hers and charts like his. A couple weeks later she thanked me effusively for that reading and said that her and her son were really back on the same page again.

So let's see, an hour free friendly telephone call and a free chart from a free program vs perscription drugs, surveillance, dysfunctional family environment, negative life altering consequences for mom and teen alike. Yeah, that Woo stuff is awful.

Quote

I am very uninterested in pursuing any defence of the legitimacy of rational thought and science as tools, you are more than aware of these, and I will take it as given that you are not denying that legitimacy and worth/value.

What I will state is that woo = GUESS. Gnostic's universal evidential search solution.

It's not the gnostic who searches for solutions in evidence...it's OMM. I know that it seems to you that I'm dodging something, but to me, every time you ask that it just fulfills my description of OMM. If you are locked in a closet of materialism, all I can do is play you music or talk to you through the door. You are the only one that can open the door and take a look at the rest of the psyche - the part that doesn't just to make money, spread the genome, or disprove that there's anything outside the closet.

Quote

Woo is the epitome of GUESSMatryoshka dulls receding in beautifully fractaled ignorances and silly superstitions.

like a priceless heirloom? Yeah, gotta get rid of that...there's leaking oil rigs to build, populations to grow.

Quote

As much as I like your flights of fancy Immed, I am bored with your reluctance to acknowledge that woo and science I am bored with your reluctance to acknowledge that woo and science do not mix, cannot mix, and never will mix.

do I'm pretty sure that they are two opposite sides of the same thing. We are the mix.

Quote

This has been pointed out by myself and by better thinkers than I here many times to you, but you dodge, twist and make partial adjustments to supposed meanings, partial allowances to opposition's accuracies.

For example? If I'm dodging anything I'm not aware of it. I'm just putting this information out here and really have no vested interest in being 'right' about it. Unless someone is going to make a point I haven't heard 1000 times before - then I'm very interested. Otherwise, don't bother trying to make close my eyes and go OMM, I've been there and know it inside out. Nothing anyone has said here has given me anything but validation of the model I describe.

Here's the conversation I keep having to have with people, so you can't tell me about dodges and twists.

"Color does not physically exist, yet it is a subjective truth" "No, Color is wavelengths"(proves it isn't)...what is color? "signals in the brain"(proves it isn't)...what is color? "it's just an interpretation""what is an interpretation? What is it made of?"...

Patterns, forms, icons, gestalts, images...what are these things that our consciousness literally consists of and why does the OMM deny their relevance if not existence?

You don't find them in the brain. There is no miniature studio with actual color holograms of the sights and stereo audio of the sound of our life. There's nothing but neurons in the brain. We know where conscious comes from, but we don't know where it physically is enacted. Where all of those neurochemical processes unfold into, what the OMM believes is 'all of the order and beauty that has ever been in the Cosmos'.

It's ridiculous.

What makes sense to me is that color is a purely interior subjective experience which can be encoded as an analog to transmit through wavelengths of light, then stepped through another layer of encoding/switching as a biochemical-optical text, then a neuro-electric signal, then as a brain text of complex neural orchestration (none of these look like color from the outside, mind you'), then finally as a reconstituted, decoded subjective experience of color in consciousness, 'white' for example.

The implication of this is that color is being experienced 'subjectively' in other places besides in side us. It could very well be that plants are green, but just not physically green. The light frequencies they kick back remind our brain of what consciousness was when it was light itself, when green was invented. Really not much different than holding invertebrate DNA copies in every cell. The spectrum is a living memory, evidence of order in the cosmos. The fact that whiteness holds the entire spectrum within it invisible points to the nature of memory and information access in the essential world. Solid state, timeless, ordered, meaningful to us.

By extension, all of our senses feed us information from the cosmos. Order. Like color, it is transduced and decoded through physical media, but the physical media is the exception - it's the gaps from the BB. Fragments of matter and energy now have to touch each other through encoded physical processes, a few of which we can consciously detect through our optical, aural, olfactory, tactile, gustatory, vestibular probes - which are just specialized nerve endings. The content is all the same going to the brain, and it's the brain that has to recognize patterns and generate patterns which we can recognize. The brain is quite familiar with the pattern it receives from the cosmos and generates to us, so much so that when a new variation shows up, special attention is paid to it.

Quote

If woo of any sort was capable of being used by science, read by science, embraced by science, in any way, then it would not be woo.

If woo was even capable of being taught in any meaningful way, it would just not be woo.

That's like saying, Quantum Mechanics were able to be used as music, added as spice, embraced by zoologists in any way, then it would not be Quantum Mechanics.

Quote

I have watched with interest your other posts around the site Immed, you have certainly generated some interesting thoughts/perspectives.

Why would they be interesting if there's no truth to them? Do you like reading Woo?

Quote

I am interested if you can actually deconstruct the internal mechanism that causes you to be the obsessive one trick pony when it comes to this particular subject.

Not a cause, but yes, there is a particular astrological correlation that gives me a specific map of this moment in my life. Not that I'd choose it. I'd stop if I could, this is brutal on my nervous system. Besides, I've got nothing else to do. Makes it easy.

k, gotta go. trying to take the day off at least so if you want to keep it going, please allow a couple days for reply. thanks.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe. ceehiro.

It is not because 'words' are things, but instead because are brains recognize patterns and it still comes up with an answer regardless of the finer detail of what is being examined. Most people can still read the statement above precisely because you're not optically detailing out each letter but instead the general appearance of the word.

You frankly need to read more about cognitive science.

Logged

"Religious faith is the antithesis to knowledge, it is the opposition to education, and it has to act in animosity against the free exchange of ideas. Why? Because those things are what cause harm to a religions place in society most." - Me

MODIFIEDOK, I will check out the link. Interesting article, but isn't the article really about cultural evolution? Too much for my tiny monkeybrain to absorb. (retreats to the trees to cogitate and scratch head and ass).

I thot artificial selection referred to man breeding dogs and plants, and Darwin came up with the term to expand on his idea of natural selection.

So, I don't understand where you are going with this.

« Last Edit: May 19, 2010, 09:43:32 AM by monkeymind »

Logged

Truthfinder:the birds adapt and change through million of years in order to survive ,is that science, then cats should evolve also wings to better catch the birdsMailbag:On a side note, back in college before my conversion, I actually saw a demon sitting next to me in critical thinking class.

Patterns, forms, icons, gestalts, images...what are these things that our consciousness literally consists of and why does the OMM deny their relevance if not existence?

They are not things and do not exist, there is in effect nothing there to deny.

(goes on to prove that word patterns supervene upon character arrangement patterns...)

Quote

You frankly need to read more about cognitive science.

Coginitive science without patterns. Interesting. OMMM.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

Patterns, forms, icons, gestalts, images...what are these things that our consciousness literally consists of and why does the OMM deny their relevance if not existence?

They are not things and do not exist, there is in effect nothing there to deny.

(goes on to prove that word patterns supervene upon character arrangement patterns...)

Quote

You frankly need to read more about cognitive science.

Coginitive science without patterns. Interesting. OMMM.

Ah dismissive non-answer.

Logged

"Religious faith is the antithesis to knowledge, it is the opposition to education, and it has to act in animosity against the free exchange of ideas. Why? Because those things are what cause harm to a religions place in society most." - Me

They are not things and do not exist, there is in effect nothing there to deny.(goes on to prove that word patterns supervene upon character arrangement patterns...)

Quote

You frankly need to read more about cognitive science.

Coginitive science without patterns. Interesting. OMMM.

Ah dismissive non-answer.

I guess you didn't get the hint. I was just surprised that you would give me an example which supports my view entirely and disproves your own so conclusively.

For the benefit of others I would be happy to explain (and happy to use this example again and again in the future) of why the example you included "Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae." shows us that recognition of visual patterns, in fact, are so powerfully influential in our experience that they will operate semi-independently of optical input.

So strong is consciousness' desire to seek patterns that it recognizes it can work around syntactic obstacles within the word to extract the precise meaning. Your visual cortex accurately reports the literal characters as they are on the OMM level, somewhat scrambled, however your conscious mind is much smarter, continuing the error-corrected pattern recognition almost seamlessly to deliver the words to consciousness. It's all pattern - the letters, the words, and the verbal meaning. They are things. Not physical things subject to the laws of physics, but discrete, true subjective experiences of essential meaning.

So thanks Omen, you have shown that not only does OMM fail to account for the mind's ability to read through the unreadable syntax (physical evidence in reality), but that in this case, the invisible, intangible, ACME-facing essential word pattern wins! It's not the type out there on the screen, but the verbalization decoding in here (the voice in your head that reads this...mockingly, I'm sure) that proves itself capable of making leaps toward pattern, rather than passively becoming obstructed by lower level patterns.

"They are not things and do not exist, there is in effect nothing there to deny."They most certainly are 'things' (there is nothing that is not a thing).

Existence depends on how you use the word. They are real, but subjectively real. Physically they do not need to exist because all physical things are informed and defined entirely by pattern. Patterns don't exist, existence is a pattern.

'in effect' there is nothing there to deny = I can't really claim there's nothing there, because there obviously is, so, well, it's almost nothing...

I'm answering your post here because I really like, and will use your example. Otherwise all of your questions only reinforce what I sketched out in the OMM column, so I know that whatever anyone says beyond 'Only Matter Matters' is just going to be ignored and ridiculed (because when people's ego is tied up in protecting their intellect, they resort to those tactics first. A scientific mind is only interested in truth, not insults, or harrassment). I don't intend to answer any of your questions.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

I guess you didn't get the hint. I was just surprised that you would give me an example which supports my view entirely and disproves your own so conclusively.

Which it doesn't do and you make no effort to elaborate upon.

Quote

For the benefit of others I would be happy to explain (and happy to use this example again and again in the future) of why the example you included "Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae." shows us that recognition of visual patterns, in fact, are so powerfully influential in our experience that they will operate semi-independently of optical input.

So strong is consciousness' desire to seek patterns that it recognizes it can work around syntactic obstacles within the word to extract the precise meaning. Your visual cortex accurately reports the literal characters as they are on the OMM level, somewhat scrambled, however your conscious mind is much smarter, continuing the error-corrected pattern recognition almost seamlessly to deliver the words to consciousness. It's all pattern - the letters, the words, and the verbal meaning.

Which has absolutely nothing to do in proving that 'words' are 'things', which is what I responded too and which the ability the cognitive recognition of patterns proves conclusively. The brain is not concerned with treating 'words' as if they are constructs, but are instead patterns of recognition that we translate into strings of interpretative understanding of concepts.

At no point does the 'word' become something, as you frequently try to claim.

Quote

They are things. Not physical things subject to the laws of physics, but discrete, true subjective experiences of essential meaning.

Those are two contradictory statements, you can't make one then conclude upon the other that totally contradicts the first statement.

Something is or it is not, it is not both.

Quote

but that in this case, the invisible, intangible, ACME-facing essential word pattern wins!

The identification of pattern recognition is an objective observation, which do not first require us to make up a conclusion beforehand nor do anything else except a purely methodological scientific approach to arriving to a conclusion based on the objective evidence at hand.

In what magical fantasy based way.. is this equatable to make believe?

Or do you mean, a blank statement and a little obfuscation, followed up by your own assertions of dominance of a subject you've never adequately addressed because you patently ignore any informative questions about what you claim.

Quote

Existence depends on how you use the word.

Nope.

Whatever existence is, it exists. The word 'existence' represents nothing and informs nothing about what 'existence' is, just like the "I" and "think" in,"I think therefore I am." do not convey any understanding of what "I" and "thinking" is.

The recognition of patterns in language is simply the cogntivie causal part of the brain that identifies pattern and interprets the information based on a causal context of information. At no point does the 'information' suddenly disappear into a void of 'space time' where something that is supposed to be 'you' recognizes what it is. The entire effect, from the arrangement of words on paper to the photons that stream between the paper and the eye, to the tracking of pulses across your optic nerves, and even into your brain.. never involves an imaginary 'stop gate' where supposedly the 'magic' happens.

Words are not 'things' and never have been, anymore then the curve of a wave or a bend in a tree.

Logged

"Religious faith is the antithesis to knowledge, it is the opposition to education, and it has to act in animosity against the free exchange of ideas. Why? Because those things are what cause harm to a religions place in society most." - Me

In what magical fantasy based way.. is this equatable to make believe?

It's not. Imagination is at the far extreme of subjectivity. Reading is a subjective decoding of a printed text (object), so nothing to do with make believe, other than the interior verbalization is a subjective text, like color which both feature prominently in dreams, meditation, guided imagery.

Quote

Words are not 'things' and never have been, anymore then the curve of a wave or a bend in a tree.

Without the curve, there is no wave. The water is just swept up an invisible condition which shapes the water into an identifiable and familiar iconic pattern. The pattern is what makes the water into a wave.

A bend in a tree is what separates it from a straight tree. It can be informally be referred to as a thing, but again. 'thing' has no definition beyond being a placeholder for what you want to refer to nonspecifically. I don't do the dictionary dance. Use your own words, and I'll use mine.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

Got it, so there are tiers of subjective 'value' that somehow mean that the other valued tiers are no longer subjective?

Again, something is or it is not.

It is subjective or it is not.

Quote

Without the curve, there is no wave.

lol A wave is not necessarily a curve, we can see a 'curve' in matter if a wave is passing through it but that does not mean that the 'wave' is a curve or that a 'curve' is anything at all. Outside the context of the objectively observed pattern recognition and the context of interpretation of the claim, a 'curve' becomes nothing at all. It does not exist outside the context of its use, it is not a thing.

Quote

A bend in a tree is what separates it from a straight tree....

Subjective nonsense again.

How is the 'bend' a thing?

Logged

"Religious faith is the antithesis to knowledge, it is the opposition to education, and it has to act in animosity against the free exchange of ideas. Why? Because those things are what cause harm to a religions place in society most." - Me

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

rhocam ~ I guess there are several trillion cells in a man, and one in an amoeba, so to be generous, lets say that there were a billion. That is one every fifteen years. So in my lifetime I should have seen two evolutionary changes.

Interesting point. Could you also say that a straight line is a curve that you are infinitely close to? (just as being on top of the surface of a finite but large sphere makes for a flat plane on the ground?)

Mathematical abstraction isn't my thing, but it's interesting.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

lol A wave is not necessarily a curve, we can see a 'curve' in matter if a wave is passing through it but that does not mean that the 'wave' is a curve or that a 'curve' is anything at all. Outside the context of the objectively observed pattern recognition and the context of interpretation of the claim, a 'curve' becomes nothing at all. It does not exist outside the context of its use, it is not a thing.

Quote

we can see a 'curve' in matter if a wave is passing through it but that does not mean that the 'wave' is a curve or that a 'curve' is anything at all

The prospect of the curve being nothing at all is the crux of this argument.

Patterns are the things that make things what they are. You don't have to consider them 'things' but finding a good term for what it is can be a little slippery. A wave is a thing in as much as you don't want to have to deny the similarity between what we see happening on the ocean and all of the other areas that manifest a 'similar' pattern - brain waves, electromagnetic waves, sound waves, waves of nausea, waving your hands, etc.

I say 'similar' because OMM has no use for similar. It doesn't get it. Everything is either a thing or it's not, right? You can't have a wave on the ocean because a wave is what you do with your hands. It's so messy - on the ocean waves are water moving up and down in a particular shape but waving your hand isn't like that at all...that's just moving your hand up and down, or side to side even...HOW can we manage to conflate these completely different phenomena so that they share the same word? What is a wave? A wave is a word for a cluster of subjective associations. It's a subjective essence - or 'subject'. A cluster itself is an abstract pattern. These associations, and their relation to each other, can be described as 'sense', or 'order'.

While we understand that the shape of an ocean wave is just 'nothing at all', we may fail to understand that the water the wave is composed of is just a shape also. The Hydrogen 'atoms' aren't anything different than waves - they are waves that act like particles because their electron clouds/shells/valence are moving so fast, that like the blades of a spinning fan, the whole spinning infinitesimal point of charged nothingness acts as if it were solid (or liquid in the case of water).

Atoms aren't things either. It's more like a round tornado with a few small chunks of trailer park in an otherwise titanic vortex of air. Things made of atoms are no different than the atoms they are made of as far as the OMM could claim to understand them. There's no special difference between one hydrogen atom sitting next to another one but we find that they are different. It matters a lot whether the two hydrogen are sitting next to an Oxygen (which is really not different from Hydrogen at all, but rather a 'grouping' (nothing at all to OMM) of eight protons instead of one. Same protons, same forces, completely different kind of matter. Why? Patterns. Groupings. Thingless Nothings at all.

This is what is meant by the Cosmos. Layer upon layer of ordered relations. Relations to hold matter together, relations to sweep it into forms and surfaces, relations to reflect and focus, to grow and animate, to replicate. The matter is part of the story. I would say that it is pattern turned inside out so that it does not act but is acted upon. The electron. The quark. Vectors of mass and charge. Useless without an orderly relation to belong to.

We are ourselves orders of orders of pattern and what we perceive is physically limited, it's heavily filtered and conditioned so that, just like the fan, (or the screen you are looking at right now, repainting itself 60 times a second from a single pixel, row by row), we lose the ability to see fast, repeating patterns as moving targets, but rather, they appear 'real' or solid. Patterns which are too slow, like watching a plant grow, appear 'like nothing at all'.

It's a continuum. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Subjective patterns and formed objects are two sides of the same continuum. They are essentially the same thing, but we are experiencing the Cosmos from inside of a nested nested nest of highly specialized patterns looking outside at a variety of other nested nested pattern clusters - some very slow and large like the Earth's orbit which must be understood cognitively rather than experienced directly, others fast and tiny and which can only be detected through repetitive abundance, and still others within the 'tangible' band of coherence. Objects. Solids, liquids.

I hope you can see now that a curve is different from nothing at all. All of the semantic nitpicking and gotcha zingers you can dish out is not going to make me join you in making believe that the universe doesn't 'really exist', and that your make believe isn't 'really make believe' just to protect the sacred OMM. Your delusion is no better than mine or anyone elses.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

The prospect of the curve being nothing at all is the crux of this argument.

... :sighs:

More strawmen.

The words you idiot! The words are not 'things', they are simply subective assertions in reference to a context of material 'things'. Is a ball a ball or is a ball a collection of billions of atoms arranged into a sphere? When did the billions of atoms in the shape of a sphere become a ball? Where was the ball when the billions of atoms were arranged into a deflated rag?

« Last Edit: May 19, 2010, 05:51:47 PM by Omen »

Logged

"Religious faith is the antithesis to knowledge, it is the opposition to education, and it has to act in animosity against the free exchange of ideas. Why? Because those things are what cause harm to a religions place in society most." - Me

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

I thot artificial selection referred to man breeding dogs and plants, and Darwin came up with the term to expand on his idea of natural selection.

Yeah, it is that. That's what we are now. Domesticated primates, bred according to artificial criteria rather than natural natural factors such as climate, access to food and water, etc.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

Because constantly building fallacies in response means we ever actually began.

Logged

"Religious faith is the antithesis to knowledge, it is the opposition to education, and it has to act in animosity against the free exchange of ideas. Why? Because those things are what cause harm to a religions place in society most." - Me

That's what we are now. Domesticated primates, bred according to artificial criteria rather than natural natural factors such as climate, access to food and water, etc.

Can it really be said that humans are no longer subject to natural selection? Sure, we have changed the world to suit our desires (large scale agriculture, urbanization, mass immunization, predator eradication, etc.) on a scale virtually unprecedented for a single species. No argument there.

But this change has happened extremely rapidly and recently, compared to most of our history. It remains to be seen if we can maintain these artificially optimized conditions in the long term. If, for example, a "perfect storm" of global war, natural disaster and disease knocked out enough of our industrial infrastructure, the survivors could find themselves back in the Iron Age at best.

I guess my question is: where do you draw the line to separate natural and artificial selection, particularly with regard to human beings? Are we really at a point where we can-- with absolute assurance-- determine what effect our environment will have on us?

I don't see us as being completely beyond natural selection yet. We are currently holding such factors as famine, disease, and others at arm's length but they have not gone away. They still affect hundreds of millions of people every year; it wouldn't take much for them to come sweeping back on a much larger scale.

Logged

Live a good life... If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones. I am not afraid.--Marcus Aurelius

Can it really be said that humans are no longer subject to natural selection?

Natural selection is just a description of the process by which species have differentiated. All we can say is that at this time, it appears that if we evolve into a different species, it won't be because of the conventional pressures on organisms since the Pre-Cambrian era.

Quote

It remains to be seen if we can maintain these artificially optimized conditions in the long term.

Sure. At this moment though, the human genome is not being selected for according to naturally occurring survival pressures.

Quote

I guess my question is: where do you draw the line to separate natural and artificial selection, particularly with regard to human beings? Are we really at a point where we can-- with absolute assurance-- determine what effect our environment will have on us?

It's really an informal distinction to differentiate between what the world does to shape the origin of species and what human beings do (to themselves or other organisms).

« Last Edit: May 19, 2010, 07:49:11 PM by Immediacracy »

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

It's really an informal distinction to differentiate between what the world does to shape the origin of species and what human beings do (to themselves or other organisms).

Thanks, Imm. I was curious as to how you personally defined the term.

As to the rest of your reply, I agree. Evolution acts continuously on entire populations, and right now most human beings are affected by selection criteria that did not exist prior to extensive urbanization and intensive agriculture.

Logged

Live a good life... If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones. I am not afraid.--Marcus Aurelius

Natural selection is just a description of the process by which species have differentiated. All we can say is that at this time, it appears that if we evolve into a different species, it won't be because of the conventional pressures on organisms since the Pre-Cambrian era.

Sure. At this moment though, the human genome is not being selected for according to naturally occurring survival pressures.

You're wrong. Natural selection is still taking place, by definition. Only context and environment has changed, so the conditions for survival are different than what they might have been thousands of years ago. But men and women still select. Beautiful women are desired by more men than ugly fat ones. Handsome successful men can pick the woman they want. There are still people that are too shy, or too unsuccessful and stay single during or for most of their lives and won't reproduce. There are also plenty of people that choose not to reproduce. Again a form of natural selection. That the conditions of this selection have changed doesn't matter one bit. That we can use tools and medicine to keep people alive in more circumstances doesn't make natural selection suddenly unnatural or artificial.

A locust plague will in short time reproduce in enormous numbers. And as long as food is abundant few of them will die and not reproduce. Similar as with men this doesn't suddenly mean that natural selection is gone for this species.

Logged

"Technological progress is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal."

Well, I absolutely am 100% OMM according to your definition. However, I don't see why a OMM person needs to be depressed, sociopathic nor apathic. Maybe some others here are because of their negative experience with religion and vague believes, maybe, but I am none of these things. I am very passionate about science, about sports, about my girlfriend and my friends. I am awed by science, the universe and its simple but effective mechanics. I am awed by life and amazed at the diversity and endless variations nature has come up with on just one single planet. But in my logics and my world view, I'm still 100% 'OMM'. Because it's the only thing that makes sense.

Well of course you can be happy as an OMM in the Netherlands. You're living in an OMMish paradise.

I don't see why a OMM person needs to be depressed, sociopathic nor apathic.

No, they don't at all. Neither does a person with an ACME worldview have to be clinically delusional, I'm just comparing that each extreme translates into if taken their logical end. You're not a depressed sociopath because you don't believe that your girlfriend is a stranger who is only exploiting a survival strategy and you don't believe that science and sports are the meaningless brain farts of an overgrown sponge.

To be a "logical end", there must be a logical argument that would lead to that conclusion. You've yet to present one, and I very much doubt that any valid argument can be made. You've stated that what you're talking about is the extreme positions. An extreme mystical/emotional philosophy on one side, and an extreme material/rational philosophy on the other. You seem (<-- key word) to be assuming that depression and apathy are the default human condition, that they are what would remain in the absence of emotion. But depression and apathy are emotional states just as much as happiness or enthusiasm. And just like happiness or enthusiasm, one can only be depressed or apathetic within the domain of what is NOT entirely rational or materialistic.

And if we relax the definition of "extreme" to allow a tiny bit of emotion at the far OMM end of the scale, I fail to see why you'd expect it to be predominantly negative emotion. Would you not expect rational people to apply their reasoning ability towards being happy rather than miserable? Do you think that reality is inherently gloomy, so that only those who are either bad at understanding reality or good at self-deception are capable of being happy?

We live in a universe of immense beauty and overwhelming awe. A magnificent reality that requires no faith beyond accepting one's own senses. I don't need to believe in unsubstantiated claims of miracles, unseen beings, or unevidenced mystical forces to find reasons to be happy. Reasons to live. Reasons to try. No. No fantasies required. All it takes is a look up into a clear night sky, or a look into the eyes of someone I care about, a deep conversation with a good friend, or pondering the elegance and beauty of mathematics. It really is a wonderful world.

Depression, sociopathy and apathy are a "logical end" of the OMM world view? Seriously?

Not sure what you mean by viable. ACME has been the default worldview for the Homo sapiens. Cultures all over the world have been getting along, for better or worse, with the ACME worldview, undoubtedly since before the dawn of civilization. I can you think of an example of a culture which cultivated an OMM worldview without first building an elaborate ACME. The OMM defensive posture relies on the ACME worldview being exclusively about superstition - that is, it prejudges and stereotypes it as being a one dimensional quantity - 0; an absence of a logical, objective worldview that becomes filled by superstition. It's a straw man caricature of the ACME, which can never contain anything but undesirable ego projections. Fear. Weakness. Sentimentality. Foolishness.

I think that your claimed "straw man caricature of the ACME", is a straw man caricature of your critics point of view. I don't think that anyone here believes or claims that real-world people with a spiritual bent could reasonably be described as exclusively superstitious, or that their world view "can never contain anything but undesirable ego projections. Fear. Weakness. Sentimentality. Foolishness." Criticizing ACME because it contains those things, is not the same as saying that that's all there is.

As for prejudging and stereotyping ACME as a one dimensional quantity, it's pretty asinine to accuse people of that when it was you who established that this little thought experiment is about extremes. That rather strongly implies that we're not talking about regular, sensible, multi-dimensional religious folks.

And I might also point out that to defend ACME by pointing out that ACME people are not completely superstitious and not completely lacking in logic or objectivity is to defend ACME to the extent that real multi-dimensional ACME people are not entirely ACME, but are partially OMM. This is the inverse of what you did when you associated depression, sociopathy, and apathy with OMM, criticising OMM to the extent that real, multi-dimensional OMM people are not entirely OMM, but are partially ACME.

This seems a bit like when creationists accuse evolution of being a religious belief and try to disguise creationism as science. This suggests that even they recognize at some level that the world view that they fight against is credible and that the one that they promote is not.

And just like happiness or enthusiasm, one can only be depressed or apathetic within the domain of what is NOT entirely rational or materialistic.

Absolutely. I included the symmetry of superstition, mania, pareidolia, woo vs cynicism, depression, sociopathy to point out some negative psychological potentials of each extremity - not 'symptoms of this worldview'. Of course actual psychological symptoms in actual people can be associated with a variety of conditions, some situational, some genetic, etc. What I was going for here is that just the ACME worldview, if taken literally is maniacal, superstitions, etc, while the OMM worldview, if taken literally is cynical, depressing, sociopathic. The OMM says that people aren't really real - that what we do or think doesn't really count. That's depressing, cynical, and sociopathic. Without being counterbalanced with a certain degree of 'it doesn't stop me from enjoying my life', etc, the findings of the OMM against human life are more grim than they are celebratory.

Quote

Would you not expect rational people to apply their reasoning ability towards being happy rather than miserable?

Do you think that reality is inherently gloomy, so that only those who are either bad at understanding reality or good at self-deception are capable of being happy?

No, I think that reality is not synonymous with OMM. Reality is both subjective and objective.

Quote

All it takes is a look up into a clear night sky, or a look into the eyes of someone I care about, a deep conversation with a good friend, or pondering the elegance and beauty of mathematics. It really is a wonderful world.

Don't just thank 'the world' (OMM world doesn't 'really' exist like you think it does), thank your eyes, your consciousness, your human mind, your memory of your life and your experiences. What will you have without them?

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

You're wrong. Natural selection is still taking place, by definition. Only context and environment has changed, so the conditions for survival are different than what they might have been thousands of years ago. But men and women still select.

It's really semantic. Natural can mean almost anything. You don't have to differentiate between natural selection and artificial selection if you want, but the context and environment that have changed because they are now completely dominated by human activities and not the conditions of the 'natural environment'. Some scientists argue that natural selection continues in Homo sapiens, some argue against it. I think the distinction is notable so I use it.

Quote

Beautiful women are desired by more men than ugly fat ones.

Which is why nature gave them plastic surgery and Spanx?

Quote

Handsome successful men can pick the woman they want.

Successful at hunting wild boar is natural, successful working at the stock exchange is 'artificial'.

Quote

That the conditions of this selection have changed doesn't matter one bit. That we can use tools and medicine to keep people alive in more circumstances doesn't make natural selection suddenly unnatural or artificial.

Not unless you make the word artificial mean 'human made'. What do you say artificial means, and why?

These are all rhetorical questions. Don't answer them for my benefit.

Logged

"That which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe."- John Archibald Wheeler

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe. ceehiro.

It is not because 'words' are things, but instead because our brains recognize patterns and it still comes up with an answer regardless of the finer detail of what is being examined. Most people can still read the statement above precisely because you're not optically detailing out each letter but instead the general appearance of the word.

If the above paragraph was giving some directions to a certain city, a chinese won't get there unless he knew english.

That means we do not always create a pre supposed existence. Something must necesarily exist otherwise we might not bother.

Logged

What if the future we hope for depends on yesterday? We only have now to live the life.